garrettdoeseverything

[garrettdoeseverything]

My 2017 in Pie Charts

This is a kind of test-run for the kind of year report I would like to make. If you’ve never heard of the feltron reports, I’d recommend you check them out to know what I’m talking about. He makes reports of various stats he keeps track of during the year and charts them to learn more about himself and his habits.

A link to his 2007 yearly report: http://feltron.com/FAR07.html

So I’m giving a prototype for my 2018 by running some stats I tracked in 2017, and seeing what I’d want to change for the coming year. Enjoy!

First off we have Films:

And now for Gaming:

Hope this inspires someone to do something cool like this, too!

[garrettdoeseverything]

In Which a Long-Awaited Museum of Modern Art Reopens

Ever since I took my last humanities class, I’ve wanted to see some of the pieces that I studied. I finally got that opportunity a few days ago thanks to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. We saw pieces from big names like Frida Kahlo, Henri Matisse, George Braque, Andy Warhol, and Rene Magritte. It was everything I had wanted it to be. I even saw some paintings from the old powerpoints that I studied from in order to pass the final exam and used as examples for my final essay, “Why Modern Art is More than Lines and Circles on a Canvas.” Allow me to elaborate on 6 superlative pieces I found in the museum:

This painting is a great example of what I love about modern art – its ambiguity and ability to be interpreted many different ways. Is the figure hopeful? Do they feel a longing for the world on the other side of the river? Or is the figure feeling isolated by the distance between himself and the carousel of the world going on outside, ignorant to his grief? That’s up to you! It can even be different things to you at different times.

Calder’s fantastic. His mobiles deliver that classic modern art gut feeling of pure shape, line, and color, with the twist that the piece is in constant motion. It’s like watching a river, or a jazz musician’s solo. You’re always seeing something new unfolding right in front of your eyes. It’s always improvising, always in flux. It’s ephemeral and motion and music and modern life all captured into one piece. Gah. I’m still geeking out about it.

Somehow I like this better than his original Whaaam! done back in the ‘60s. It’s from a different point of view this time. You can’t see the airplane’s nationality, either. And it’s like he’s drawing back the curtain and showing you that all print is just a bunch of dots close up. Very, very pretty dots.

You know, sometimes a tie feels exactly like that, a snake squeezing the life right outta you. Especially if you’re a missionary walking on the baking sheets that are the sidewalks of Santiago, Chile in the summer.

The actual work done by the artist is only a set of instructions. LeWitt gives the museum curators some vague directions on how to put the crayon lines on the grid, and the rest is up to the museum to interpret and recreate. So every time this piece changes hands, it’s technically being made anew all over again. Gives the piece a sort of mystery and a life of its own.

Is this a statement about our bodies being an amalgamation of atoms? Or maybe it’s about our personalities? Or society / humanity at large? That’s up to you to decide! Aaarrrrrtttt!

Shout outs to Uncle Todd, Aunt Rebecca, Joanna, and my awesome wife for helping make this trip happen. If you ever go to San Francisco, I’d recommend you visit this place. It’s been closed for such a long time and it’s awesome that it’s finally open again for us to enjoy.

[garrettdoeseverything]

We're finally in the room where it happens!! #hamilton #whatislife

[garrettdoeseverything]

Goal 59: Go through a large, well-known art museum. Checking this off with the San Francisco MoMA! Pieces seen included Matisse, Munch, Lichtenstein, Pollock, and Calder. #sfmoma #modernart #101list #dayzeroproject (at SFMOMA San Francisco Museum of Modern Art)

[garrettdoeseverything]

Our next board game involves delivering potions to the various folk that all live in towers for some reason. It's called Broom Service, and it's a fun one. #boardgamesgeek #101list #dayzeroproject

[garrettdoeseverything]

I'll be playing Legend of Zelda in Japanese (or as they call it, Zeruda no Densetsu) to help improve my reading skills. #zelda #japanese #101list #dayzeroproject

[garrettdoeseverything]

Super Metroid is in every sense a masterpiece. It just might beat Metroid Prime as my favorite in the series. That finishes classic game No. 3! #metroid #classicvideogames #101list #dayzeroproject

[garrettdoeseverything]

You know, Samus's grapple beam is super interesting. There's just so much you can do with it, I feel like it really... pulls you in. #puns #metroid #classicvideogames #101list #dayzeroproject

[garrettdoeseverything]

What is the taco but a semicircular canvas? Trying out 180 Tacos in Provo today. #foodie #101list #dayzeroproject #tacos

[garrettdoeseverything]

Celebrating two finals done with Ethiopian food at Mahider in SLC. Try as we could, we could not finish this plate. #foodie #ethiopian #101list #dayzeroproject

[garrettdoeseverything]

In Which Our Hero Gushes About His School De-stresser

I’ve been a big fan of video games, but I’ve never really dived into the indie scene until now. I really wanted to broaden my horizons with these games, and this goal certainly did that. As I’ve become an adult and matured in my approach to media, I’ve noticed that you can actually get a lot out of video games. If you have the right mindset, they can be just as enriching an experience as Literature, Visual Art, or Film. I could probably ramble on and on about these games, but for the sake of time, I’m just going to give you a brief overview of my experiences with each game. So let’s get started!

Since there’s no official ending to this game, I decided to call it “finished” when I reached the end of my second in-game year, when all of my goals had been reached. It’s dangerous that this game has no end, because I could easily play this game indefinitely. Stardew Valley has made it to a lot of Top 10s and favorites lists, and this game earns all of those placements. This game is one of the best examples I’ve seen of a new developer taking a good idea from the past and building it into something better.

Stardew has a heavy Harvest Moon influence, for sure, but also incorporates elements from RPG games, Animal Crossing, and Minecraft. There are so many things I love about this game: the leveling up in different skill areas, the time-management challenge, and the character / play customization, among others.

The most compelling thing for me, however, was restoring the town to its old glory and befriending the NPCs. I fully went into this game expecting the NPCs to be these flat characters, but boy was I wrong. It’s a diverse cast with poignant backstories. They have their own cliques, their own goals, and their own conflicts with other NPCs. Stardew covers a variety of issues we see in our modern-day society, including PTSD, depression, disability, poverty, the environment, and race, just to name a few. There are aspiring artists, conniving corporate managers, and rebellious youth. I found myself making spreadsheets of what gifts everyone liked, just so I could unlock more backstory.

I definitely recommend it to anyone who loves Harvest Moon or Animal Crossing games.

This game is arguably the most beautiful pixel art game you will ever play. I want to hang screenshots of this game on my freaking wall. From wide photogenic vistas to minute details, this game is visually impressive. And the soundtrack only heightens your sense of immersion.

This game also gives a lot of challenges. I'm referring not only to the challenging difficulty, but also to how Hyperlight Drifter challenges typical storytelling. When speaking to NPCs, all you get to decipher what they’re saying is their body language and some pictures to illustrate a narrative. Think of those children’s books with just pictures and no words – conversation in this game is exactly like that. As you interact with the world, you create the narrative. I’ve seen people take issue with this, but I really enjoy it. It was exciting to fill in the gaps yourself and make some theories about what happened to the worlds' various inhabitants.

Gameplay-wise, you mostly fight monsters in fast-paced combat that is the epitome of the phrase “easy to learn but hard to master.” Even in the late game, when you have lots of upgrades, the game demands that you stay on your toes. You pay for every careless move. You also do a lot of exploring and looking for secrets, but I felt like the game was a little too inscrutable with these at first. I eventually figured out that the game left you clues, if only I could have had a hint at it during the early game.

I’ve heard people say that this game is similar to the Zelda games, but the cryptic Sci-Fi setting, the searching for secrets, and the upgrade system make it feel more like a Metroid game to me. I have soooo many things to say about this game, and not enough time to say it. I may even come back to this game at a later time and give you guys my extended thoughts on it.

If games were food, then Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove is like a nostalgic & comforting grilled cheese sandwich. It deserves all the praise it gets. I’m going to break down this review into the different campaigns, since each one is so different:

Continuing with food metaphors, Shovel of Hope (2014) is the vanilla flavor of the campaigns. I don’t mean that in a bad way, either – this game is one heck of a good vanilla. The level design quality of this game is on par with the classics that it tries to evoke. Using only a few simple controls and attacks (with some cool spell upgrades to boot), you progress through more and more intricate platforming challenges. The soundtrack is catchy, the retro-ness is spot on, and the characters are all memorable. It feels like all the NES games packed into one unique super-platformer experience.

Plague of Shadows (2015) builds upon the foundation Shovel of Hope made in ways I did not expect them to go. At first I was worried, because I struggled with Plague Knight’s controls and level design, and I wasn’t really sold on the story. But the more I played, the more this alchemist villain bombed his way into my heart. Speaking of which, Plague Knight’s bomb crafting system is one of the most unique gameplay mechanics I’ve ever seen. You mix and match powders and casings to change the way your bombs explode, which in turn changes how you fight and jump around. Your play style changes from Shovel Knight’s straightforward jump-and-pogo to a more calculated, experimental, methodical approach. Your gameplay eventually begins to match Plague Knight’s character. And that, my friends, is good game design. By the time I came to end of the game, I could finally handle his controls decently, and the story even ended up better than I anticipated. My only complaint is that I wish Plague Knight got a level or two that were totally unique to his campaign. The small changes made to each level were good, but it wasn’t quite enough.

Specter of Torment (2017) is probably the one campaign that I will keep playing and replaying the most. Specter Knight is just so cool. I picked up with his controls the quicker than the two other games, and from then on the game was just one jumping, slashing, sliding joyride. The sense of momentum and the complex platform challenges make you feel like a ninja, zipping this way and that. Best of all, Specter Knight has his own unique levels in the form of flashbacks. Maybe I’m just a sucker for tragic backstories, but to me, the story is far better than the previous two installments. It really moves you by the end. Add in the quirky hubworld of the Tower of Fate, and you have a game that, for me, is the best installment of the series yet.

Diaries of a Spaceport Janitor is a quirky game that deliberately breaks a lot of video game conventions. It’s gutsy to develop a game like this. You are the cursed janitor of a spaceport, with hopes of someday leaving to go to a better life someplace else. But you have to break the curse before you can leave. You roam around the spaceport picking up trash, praying to various shrines for luck, and keeping a few valuable things you find for yourself, all the while avoiding the mysterious police that like to bully you and steal your money. You can sell what you find at the various markets, or incinerate it for a cheap buck from your employer.

The game embraces the fact that you are not a hero. All around you are these warriors, wizards, pilots, and other big-shots that are all on their way to some epic quest, while you are the NPC that is there in the background, adhering to a day-by-day schedule and taking in the world around you as you go.

The routine was calming, almost meditative, for me. I don’t think it may be for everyone, especially those who like fast-paced games, but I enjoyed spending an in-game day or two after homework was done to help relax. There’s always something new to see, or something new to pick up.

Furthermore, it’s not afraid to talk about important social issues. It depicts poverty without being condescending or preachy. Every now and then the game works against you in acquiring your goals – prejudice of NPCs, bad luck, and oppressive social systems all begin to weigh on your character. Just when you’re feeling frustrated about a certain thing that happened in the game, you have an “a-ha!” moment where you realize people in poverty might experience exactly the same. It’s simultaneously cute, weird, and poignant. If you approach this game with an open mind, I think you will enjoy it.

Fez was one of those games I had heard about for a long time and never got around to playing, and was one of the reasons why I wanted to do this challenge in the first place. Being a newcomer to the indie scene, Fez for me appears to be a game that has aged pretty well and is still a compelling one to pick up.

Fez is a 2-D platformer, with the twist that the main character, Gomez, has a fez that can shift dimensions and alter how the terrain appears. In reality, his world is 3-D on a cube, but can only be seen in two dimensions at a time. I think I explained that well enough?

Anyway, lots of clever puzzles ensue on this premise. If you ever played Portal, think back to when you first saw how the portal mechanic worked and thought, “Wow, this changes everything.” That’s kind of how I reacted to Fez. The dimension shifting took a bit of getting used to, but once I did, I quite enjoyed myself. I love a good puzzle game, and this one delivered exactly that. I also think how fitting that the game is based on cube-to-flat dimensions, and the game espouses pixel art to match that mechanic. Quite clever. There’s even lots of secrets and background lore to find out, but some were even more enigmatic than Hyper Light Drifter. Really. Setbacks aside, there’s nothing quite like the satisfaction of solving a good riddle, and Fez delivers this quite well.

Congratulations, you made it to the end! Thanks for humoring me as I gushed on and on about these games. If you want to talk more about them, feel free to pick my brain! I only scratched the surface with these games. We haven’t even covered the themes I found in them! But that can be for some other time.

Goal 3 complete!

[garrettdoeseverything]

In Which We Receive a Brief History Lesson with the Completion of Goal 94

On August 17th, 1909, a paleontologist named Earl Douglass found the neck bones of an Apatosaurus above the ground in the wilderness near the Utah-Colorado border. He was on commission from the Carnegie Museum of Natural History to find Jurassic-period specimens that were reported to be in the area. What began with a simple dig became an excavation of hundreds of dinosaur skeletons, lasting over 30 years of quarrying. They’ve sent the skeletons to museums all across the country, including the Smithsonian.

Jumping back hundreds of millions of years ago, the site was a riverbed where dinosaurs of all sorts gathered. Later, their bones were scattered by the river and preserved deep in the clay. Add in an arid climate and a little tectonic activity to push them up, and it was ready for human discovery. By the 1950s, paleontologists agreed to create an exhibit of the quarry itself, leaving several of the bones there in the rock for the public to see. And thus Dinosaur National Monument was born.

We took about 3 hours to get there, but it was so worth it. There’s a certain magic to seeing the fossils right there, in the rock, and seeing a bit of the process of how these specimens are found, dug out of the ground, and preserved for generations to see. There was an interactive display that labeled which bones belonged to what dinosaur, and where they fit. We saw the bones of Apatosaurus, Stegosaurus, and Diplodocus. Neck bones, leg bones, back plates, ribs, they were all there in a big jumbled mess. Since the river’s movement mixed all the bones together, it was quite difficult to tell what was what, so I was really glad they included such a helpful display.

Also, while we were up there, I found out that Utah has an organization called the Utah Friends of Paleontology. They do educational meetings, and they even give volunteers the opportunity to help professional paleontologists on digs and preparing fossils for display! I’m seriously considering joining this group. It will likely become an item for a future 101 list. 

Our national parks and monuments are really one of the best ideas this country has ever come up with. I recommend it, especially for anyone interested in the scientific process and paleontology. And of course, I’m sending links your way about the park’s site and the Friends of Paleontology site.

https://www.nps.gov/dino/index.htm

http://carnegiequarry.com/

http://www.utahpaleo.org/

Goal 94 complete!

[garrettdoeseverything]

Ambiance for homework today is provided by the Fez OST, also by Disasterpiece, the same guy who did the Hyper Light Drifter OST. #soundtrack #indiegames #101list #dayzeroproject

[garrettdoeseverything]

He's small, he's white, he can manipulate dimensional space, and he reminds of an adipose from Doctor Who. Fez was a fun and adorable game. And that wraps up my last indie game for the list! #fez #indiegames #101list #dayzeroproject

[garrettdoeseverything]

It's too bad the dinosaurs were never around to hear jokes about them. I guess that's what you get for living in Prehysterical times. #dinosaurs #nationalparks #101list #dayzeroproject

[garrettdoeseverything]

Albums 17 and 18 are Plague of Shadows OST and Specter of Torment OST. When I can justify spending money again, I'll purchase all of these soundtracks. But for now, yay for Bandcamp! #soundtrack #shovelknight #101list #dayzeroproject

[garrettdoeseverything]

New Album 16 - Our soundtrack for homework today is the chiptunes of Shovel Knight OST. #soundtrack #101list #dayzeroproject